Vital Signs: START helps people facing crises START is the creation of Joan Beasley, a licensed mental health counselor who holds a doctorate in public policy from the Heller School at Brandeis University and currently serves as the director of the Center for START Services at the University of New Hampshire's Institute on Disability.

A quarter-century later, the Audrey Marie Hilley criminal saga is still bizarreIn between her initial arrest in 1979 and her capture in Vermont four years later, Hilley changed her identity twice, married, left and returned to a man in New Hampshire, and faked her own death. Her life story has been the subject of two true-crime books, a made-for-television movie starring Judith Light, and countless television programs from Unsolved Mysteries to Dr. G Medical Examiner.

Nashua relative trendsetter for interracial marriages in New Hampshire Of the marriages performed from 2008-10 in which at least one participant lived in Nashua, 13.7 percent of the couples were of different races. That's higher than the statewide percentage of 9.7 for the same period, according to a report released by the Pew Research Center earlier this month.

Jury selection to start in NY triple-murder case The defense plans to call an employee of a Keene, N.H., pawn shop, meanwhile, who in a written deposition stated that Colegrove and Slocum appeared "lovey dovey" at the pawn shop where they sold coins and jewelry later in the evening of July 13.

Army recruiter from NH to dine at White House Ranfos, a 26-year-old who grew up in Manchester, N.H., enlisted in the Army in September of 2004. He earned the Army Commendation Medal with Valor during his first stint in Iraq, when he and another soldier were targeted by a suicide bomber in March 2006 while they manned a security checkpoint in central Baghdad. A Suburban "smashed into our checkpoint and blew up," Ranfos recalled.

The Atlantic: 5 Ways to Make College Much More Affordable for All Americans Make sure students graduate, and graduate faster - Schools that do better on these measures, such as Southern New Hampshire University and BYU-Idaho, do several things well. They reduce the odds that students will take extra credits that don't lead to a degree, and they revamp antiquated transfer agreements that wrongly deny students credit for work done elsewhere.

When you can't retire early, 'practice'Fee-only financial planner Jill Boynton of Cornerstone Financial Planning in Newington, N.H., has seen the pain. “Lots of people don't have as much as they had hoped,'' said Boynton. These days it's not uncommon to see people who are 10 percent shy of what they had hoped to spend annually in retirement, she said.

Recession hit young adults hardestKatelynne Sullivan, of Glens Falls, plans to attend graduate school, but prefers to do it as she works a full-time job as a teacher. Sullivan is a May 2009 graduate of Keene State College in New Hampshire. She got her bachelor's degree in physical education for K-12.

Bay State works to attract ebbing film projects“R.I.P.D.,'' a feature film shot in Boston last year, starring Ryan Reynolds, Kevin Bacon, and Jeff Bridges, employed 936 Massachusetts residents, 147 from Rhode Island, 69 from New Hampshire, and 28 from Maine.

Hollywood is ready for Oscar night!Tourists out on Hollywood Boulevard are snapping pictures and taking in all the sights. Two sisters from New Hampshire say it's not what they expected after watching the Oscar arrivals on TV. "Totally different from what you see on television. In some ways, it's smaller, but in other ways it's big. It's definitely an experience, a terrific experience," said Donna Burke from Portsmouth, N.H. Burke and her sister Debbie Sutherland said they got to walk on the red carpet Friday and even touch the Oscar statues.

CIRO LOPEZ GARCIA / MARCO GARCIA v. USA - Convictions affirmed SOUTER, Associate Justice. The defendant-appellants, Ciro Lopez Garcia ("Lopez") and Marco Garcia ("Garcia") were convicted of conspiracy to distribute cocaine, and to possess it with intent to distribute, in violation of 21 U.S.C. §§ 841(a)(1), 841(b)(1)(A)(ii), and 846. Lopez claims that the evidence was insufficient to prove him a conspirator, and in the alternative he challenges the sentencing judge's finding of the amount of the drug attributable to him. Garcia raises plain error in admitting evidence of law enforcement officers' precautions in executing a search warrant, and in the trial court's failure to declare a mistrial sua sponte in response to prosecution testimony referring to a threat of violence by one of Garcia's co-conspirators and to the Mexican origin of the drugs. We see no reversible error and affirm.

U.S.-Russian Trade Ties Face Some Political Snags "There is more that we can do to support human rights, civil society and freedom of expression in Russia," Senator Jeanne Shaheen, Democrat of New Hampshire, said in a recent floor speech. "Passing the Magnitsky bill is one of them."

Who are Romney's most loyal donors?Thomas Stemberg, Staples co-foiunder and now managing general partner at the Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Highland Consumer Fund, is one of 40 donors who have been underwriting Romney's White House ambitions for almost a decade. Since 2004, they have made a combined $11 million in donations as a down payment on Romney's political future. Stemberg's stake, so far, is $100,000.

Fred Karger's Campaign Site Was Shut Down Because It Criticized LDS Church Terra Eclipse based in Aptos, California ... developed and designed my web site 21 months ago and had hosted it ever since. I spent tens of thousands of dollars with this company which specializes in Republican campaign web sites. So you can imagine my shock, when just two days before Christmas, Terra Eclipse sent me a terse email saying that it was dropping me in two weeks - just five days before the all-important New Hampshire Primary. What? Why?

Nashua Telegraph: Getting pay data from congressional delegation like pulling teethIt seemed like such a simple question when in December we asked Sens. Jeanne Shaheen and Kelly Ayotte and Reps. Charlie Bass and Frank Guinta to provide their staffs' salaries. It is, after all, an issue of public interest to the people who pay those salaries with their taxes. You would have thought we were asking for the keys to the Fort Knox gold bullion repository.

Jays fans given reason to dream“We do need some things to break right and we do need help. The depth that we do have is all kids, but kids with talent and ceiling and upside. From that standpoint, a year from now we could be talking about a rotation where we have too many guys, which is great. It can change that fast with the guys we have that would end up on the five man and then the guys that are right behind them in New Hampshire.”

iRacing A Key To Pastrana's NASCAR CampaigniRacing logos will also be on the side of his car as primary sponsor in four East races: Richmond Intl. Raceway on April 26, Langley Speedway on June 23, Iowa Speedway on Aug. 3 and New Hampshire Motor Speedway on Sept. 22.